Study of Properties of AlN Thin Films Deposited by Reactive Magnetron Sputtering

Study of Aluminum nitride (AlN) thin film deposited on silicon wafer and glass substrates by DC magnetron sputtering technique at different power variation. The X-ray diffraction and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) study revealed the formation of the AlN phase. The optical characteristics of films, such as refractiveindex, extinction coefficient, and average thickness, were calculated by Swanepoel's method using transmittance measurements. The refractiveindex and average roughness values of the films increased with film thickness. At lower power (100W) and constant gas ratio the film surface roughness was 1.7 nm. It was observed that films coated at lower power were 75% transparent in the visible spectral region.